Logical Consequences Coda
by rachw
Summary: Sookie chose Sam, and Eric left for Oklahoma. What was really most likely to come next in the world of Sookie Stackhouse? Spoiler: it wasn't a normal, safe life with a happy ending for Sookie.


A/N: This alternate version of the coda imagines what was more likely to happen to our SVM friends and enemies, given the events of DEA. Written in response to a Weekly One-Shot Challenge, Week #45, Write us a Coda (www dot thesookieverse dot com/2013/11/weekly-one-shot-challenge dot html)

Many thanks to awesome beta Suki59 (www dot fanfiction dot net /u/1783896/Suki59u), whose comments were extremely helpful. Check out her fics along with her book, Drop Dead Gorgeous (amzn dot com/1495215075).

Characters are listed in a "story" order, not alphabetically, so read from top to bottom.

**Sam Merlotte**

Sam was thrilled that he finally had a shot with Sookie. For several months things went well—they had sex, ate meals together, talked about their days, and enjoyed each other's company. Sam knew it was difficult for Sookie at times to repress her sadness about everything that had happened with the vampires, but he thought that if he just hung in there she would eventually really love him as more than a friend.

Sam didn't spend much time questioning whether he really loved Sookie, or if he was just still reeling from his near-death experience and grateful to finally have a claim on the woman he'd been possessive of for so long. Unfortunately, their familiarity meant that it was too easy for Sam to simply slide into Sookie's life and household, the couple focusing so many of their conversations on bar problems. They never really did the work of finding out if they were compatible as partners rather than objects of desire or fallback plans.

Sam had always liked a challenge in a woman. Had his past obsession with Sookie—who was undeniably feisty and challenging—just been part of that longing for the untamed? He didn't like to think about it too much, or about the fact that Sookie was looking for the opposite of wildness and adventure these days. Sam clung to the belief that his brush with death and resurrection had fundamentally changed him and his attitudes, but he soon resumed his long habit of fussing at Sookie over her decisions. Sam had never given her a choice about whether she wanted to be a partner in the bar instead of getting paid back, and had always disrespected her decisions when they involved anybody supernatural. Now, he fussed about how late she worked, and whether JB and Tara were taking advantage of her, and that she wouldn't sell off her old house that held so many memories and move into one of his apartments. Sam might have liked wild women, but a part of him also liked control—liked to have the final say, especially with a woman.

One afternoon, following a particularly bad argument, Sam decided to spend the evening tending bar instead of dealing with his problems at home. After An took off to Texas, Sam had brought in a new waitress—a young girl with a head of shocking pink hair. She was spirited and sassy, but also was young enough to take orders from him without too much resistance. They hung around talking after the shift, and Sam poured them both a drink. Then another. Nothing happened that night, but Sam felt Sookie distancing herself from him not long afterward. He never realized that Sookie was catching his fantasies about the new girl in graphic detail every time they had sex. It also wasn't too long before Sam was actually having sex with the new waitress, who he'd found was easy enough to control underneath her outer layer of sass.

At Sookie's request, Sam moved out of Sookie's house just shy of a year after she'd brought him back to life.

**Sookie Stackhouse**

Sookie and Sam dated for a while, with Sam unofficially moving into the old farmhouse after a few months. Sookie assumed they'd eventually get married. After the trauma of the past couple of years of her life, she didn't examine things too closely and tried not to question whether she had real feelings for Sam. He was easy and comfortable and seemed grateful for what he could get of her time and attention.

After a few months, Sookie's doubts crept in and she questioned the ease of their relationship. She eventually realized that Eric had deliberately pushed her toward Sam, and had taken steps to make Sookie hate him so she wouldn't attempt the sort of dangerous rescue missions she had accomplished in the past, like her pursuit of Bill in Jackson. Some nights when Sam stayed at his trailer after working very late at the bar, Sookie lay awake in the quiet dark of her home and wondered if she should still try to pull off a dramatic rescue of Eric, but she just didn't seem to have any fight left in her after Eric went away. She dreaded the thought that if she succeeded in setting him free, Eric might not welcome her efforts but might instead leave her alone once again.

Eventually, the cracks in her relationship with Sam grew wider. Sam tried to boss her around and tell her she was being stupid when she'd make decisions for new events or offerings at the bar. He acted jealous when he thought she was too flirty with a customer, in a way that made her deeply uneasy. She'd always thought those behaviors had been because of his dislike of vampires, but Sam didn't have that excuse anymore.

Sookie's ability to read Sam clearly increased as she spent more time with him, but it had always been fairly clear during sex. She had been able to ignore that at first, because Sam's thoughts, after so many years of wanting her, were saturated with need and desire that made her feel sexy and confident. She tried not to fault him for the fantasies he eventually started having as the heat of their sex life waned. After all, she sometimes thought of Eric's cool body during sex; Sam just couldn't catch her at it. Sookie was bothered though when she saw a fantasy about his sex with the maenad who had almost killed her (and who nearly drove her insane while Sam watched). It became too much to bear when she started seeing his ever-more-frequent fantasies of "real" people—like the new waitress at the bar.

Sam and Sookie didn't stay together much longer after she realized how often he was thinking of someone else, how petty and angry he could become so quickly, and how she had sort of been manipulated into choosing Sam in the first place. With all this on her mind, Sookie asked Sam to stay in his trailer for a little while to give her time to think, and took some time off from the bar. She wasn't sure she wanted to go back there, but she wasn't sure what else to do either.

The night Sam came by to pick up his stuff from Sookie's house was the last night on earth for both of them.

Sookie would never know it, but worse things were planned for her if she hadn't died when she did. With Niall's intervention, she had felt confident in her arrogant dismissal of Agent Lattesta. What she should have remembered from her many years of listening in on humans was that men with a tiny bit of power, when humiliated and scared—especially by a woman—will do anything to get revenge. Thus it was that Lattesta had obsessively tracked Sookie, learned more about her than even Bill ever had, and turned over everything he'd discovered to his buddy in the CIA.

While the FBI couldn't typically yank someone off the street and force them into service, the CIA had a lot more flexibility when it came to securing assets. Vampires weren't the only dangerous group who would like to control and use a powerful telepath in interrogations, after all. The CIA had previously obtained another telepath, shipped him overseas, and forced him to participate in interrogations of terrorism subjects who were tortured. He lasted two years before he had a complete mental breakdown. When he refused to cooperate, he too was physically punished. A plan to yank Miss Stackhouse out of her life in Louisiana—which could never be normal, vampires or no, due to her telepathy—had been scheduled to take place just weeks after her death.

**Karin Slaughter**

When Karin learned more fully of the inadequacies of Eric's arrangements—Sookie's protection for one year only, the provisions against only vampires taking or harming the telepath, the lack of a daytime guard while Karin traveled back and forth from Bill's—she was disgusted. It was a vast disappointment to her that her maker had not done better by this vulnerable mortal woman he claimed to love.

Karin had hoped to like and respect the famous telepath who had undoubtedly saved her maker and sister many times, but Sookie's immediately falling into a relationship with the shifter disgusted her as well. Karin departed the very second her year of service was completed.

Karin also considered it an embarrassment that Eric hadn't managed to retain the right to be in contact with his own progeny.

After she made arrangements to have Eric release her and faced her maker one last time, Karin took off alone for a few months to mourn. She later returned for a while keep her sister Pam company in their shared disappointment and grief before going on to have many more adventures.

**Eric Northman**

Eric saw Karin one last time when he released her which was also when he learned of Sookie's death. After Karin petitioned the council—she couldn't ask Eric directly due to the terms of the contract—they approved Karin's release but left it to Freyda to make arrangements as Eric's new master.

Freyda couldn't resist the opportunity to humiliate Eric once more, knowing the pain he would suffer over news of Sookie's death and Karin's request, both of which she had learned of before he did and kept from him. She would have liked to make him hear the news and perform the release before all of her subjects, but did not want them to learn the details of how inadequately Eric had bargained to protect his human. His ability to protect the Queen was one reason she wanted him around, after all. Instead, Freyda settled for standing over him while his progeny outlined all the reasons she was no longer willing or able to serve him, painfully reminding the Viking of his losses. Freyda laughed throughout, mocked his inadequacy, and refused the two any private goodbye.

Eric never heard from Karin or Pam again during the course of his servitude. He never made another progeny while in Freyda's service. While it might have created an ally for Eric, the new vampire would have been at Freyda's mercy as well. Those who suggested he should create a new vampire simply to have his own plaything to control were treated to a lengthy diatribe on the responsibilities of a maker. Nobody had yet called him on the irony of his holding strong opinions about this topic while being completely estranged from his own progeny.

Eric frequently thought about the night when Ocella lost control of Alexei—when Eric had sunk to the floor, had given up, and Pam was unable to help due to serious injury. Only Sookie had remained standing, had told Eric to snap out of it, had insisted on a plan. He should have realized then that despite his thousand years, he needed her strength and imagination to work his way out of the disaster with his maker, with Freyda. Sookie had refused to let him sit there hopeless, even while his rib cage protruded from his chest—instead she simply had Jason shove Eric's ribs back in.

Regretting his failures now served no purpose, but Eric knew with absolute certainty that he should have spoken directly with Sookie, fought Freyda together with his warrior lover, instead of treating the marriage situation as only his problem to solve. Instead he kept Sookie away, out of the loop. It was inconceivable to him now how he could possibly have disregarded so much evidence that he and Sookie worked best when they worked together, and that keeping Sookie away from vampires was no real shield against those who would harm her. Pam had been right all along. They had all three paid for his foolishness, his arrogance.

With Karin gone, Sookie dead, and Pam gravely injured, Eric gave up hope of breaking his (usually) figurative chains any time soon. He needed time to create new allies before he could even consider freeing himself from Freyda. For a brief period after Sookie's death, he was able to get enjoyment out of having hate sex with the Queen, but awareness of his physical servitude, so much like what he had experienced at the hands of his maker, always overcame any possibility of real, lasting pleasure.

Over the years, Eric heard the murmurs that the once-mighty Viking had learned to enjoy his enslavement, but none who said such things knew him at all. To those who did know him, it could not be clearer that he had spent his long existence avoiding the kind of control his maker once wielded over his actions, his time, and his body. Contrary to the belief of a few who thought him simply working his way up, he could not rise in the power structure from his position as consort, and indeed could have become a king any time in the past few hundred years if he had ever actually desired it.

Despite the material luxury of living with a monarch, despite Freyda's beauty, despite easy access to convenient bloodbags, nothing about his current existence was truly enjoyable as he had no real freedom, nothing that was his that couldn't be taken away at Freyda's whim. Eric knew there were humans who thought an abused wife must secretly enjoy her pain if she wouldn't or couldn't leave, who thought a woman could not claim rape if she had gone along with sex in order to avoid death. He believed those who thought he would learn to enjoy his captivity were cut from that same cruel cloth, and he despised them—human and vampire alike.

**Felipe de Castro**

Felipe had never intended to make Eric Northman suffer under Freyda's rule for 200 years; the very idea of it was absurd. No, he had simply intended to show the Viking who was boss, and punish him for his role in Victor's death. After all, he couldn't allow the vampires of three states to believe him a weak king.

Felipe always assumed that Eric had a plan to escape Freyda. When the former Sheriff volunteered to add 100 years to his sentence in exchange for one year of direct protection for the lovely Miss Stackhouse, it only made Felipe more certain that Northman would be out from under Freyda's thumb within the year. Felipe simply couldn't imagine the thousand-year-old Viking warrior vampire accepting his fate as consort to one such as Freyda. She was beautiful and ambitious, yes, but she was not the one Eric had chosen. Felipe's extensive research had confirmed his belief that Eric was big on having choices and freedom—as much as was possible within the vampire hierarchy.

Felipe expected Eric to bide his time while putting a plan in place, and then to overthrow Queen Freyda sometime before the year of protection ended. Eric had never expressed an interest in being King; it was one of many reasons Felipe had allowed him to live past the takeover of Louisiana. Felipe believed Eric would be willing to cede Oklahoma to his former king in exchange for a pardon in Freyda's murder and access to Miss Stackhouse, whose services Felipe would then demand.

When he realized just how wrong he was, Felipe was gravely disappointed. Northman had seemed to simply roll over and accept his servitude to the Queen. The King's extensive spy network could detect no plots of rebellion, despite reports of Eric's frequent humiliation by Freyda, and Northman had turned away the minions Felipe had sent to secretly aid him.

When Miss Stackhouse met her untimely demise, all hope of inspiring the Northman to rebellion seemed lost, alongside the valuable and beautiful telepath. A waste, truly.

For his own part, Felipe was sorry for his role in Miss Stackhouse's death.

Felipe claimed when questioned that he had sent Quinn simply to check on Miss Stackhouse following Karin's departure, and had sent Weres for the purpose of tracking the tiger and ensuring his return. If Sookie had volunteered to work for Felipe, perhaps in exchange for further protection, that would have been permissible under the terms of the contract. No vampire could use or harm her, but she could have freely chosen to be in Felipe's employment.

Unfortunately, when the shifter Merlotte attacked Quinn—on a full moon night no less—the ensuing fight ended the telepath's life. Felipe had actually predicted a scuffle of some sort, perhaps between Quinn and Mr. Compton, and had hoped to arrive just in time to save Sookie. She was well known for throwing herself into the middle of dangerous situations, after all. He might have argued that the only chance to save her from irreparable harm had been to turn her, tying her to him for eternity. Felipe suspected that Eric had meant to leave that little loophole in the contract for himself, Karin, or Pam; it was a gamble that Eric would have deeply regretted if Felipe had turned Sookie. Due to the tiger's inability to control the situation, Felipe had not arrived in time and Miss Stackhouse bled out on the front lawn.

Because the woefully short-sighted contract only stipulated that no vampire would harm Miss Stackhouse, nobody was required to pay even the most meager of fines in compensation for her death.

Felipe knew that with Miss Stackhouse's death and the loss of support from his other women, Northman could no longer hope to pull off a coup against Freyda even if he wanted to. Felipe had no choice for the time being but to let the Viking rot in Oklahoma, and he regretted what certainly seemed a waste of the formerly impressive vampire. He had only ever meant to control Eric, not destroy him.

**John Quinn**

When Quinn was sent by Felipe to "check on" Sookie after that first year had passed, he honestly thought he had a shot at winning back her affections, which just proved how stupid the tiger really was. He never thought to question the timing of his visit—planned for a full moon—nor did he question why 30 wolves were needed simply to escort him to Louisiana and back. They weren't really there for Quinn, of course. They were back-up in case Karin, Compton, Merlotte, or Pam interfered with Felipe's plans. They were also there to possibly escort a king and his newly turned telepath back to Nevada, but they never got to fulfill that duty.

Quinn should have anticipated a chilly reception from Sookie after his past betrayal. What he didn't anticipate was Merlotte showing up to collect his belongings on the same night, or the agitation of the full moon leading to a brawl between tiger and lion. The violence was too much for the Weres, who themselves shifted and joined the melee.

When Sookie stepped off the porch toward her two blood-drenched former lovers, she was taken down by a particularly violent Were who was no longer in control of his senses. Tiger and lion, both fatally injured, heard Sookie whisper "Eric" as she lay dying in the yard, but the vampire couldn't come for her now, just as he hadn't come when the fairies took her. This time, there was no one left who could save Sookie Stackhouse—including herself—and both Quinn and Sam followed her into death.

**Bill Compton**

Bill Compton did not arrive in time to save Sookie Stackhouse, and it is one of his greatest regrets. One the evening of his love's demise he was nearby at home, driving his cock relentlessly into a heavily glamoured, bleach blonde human. She was a poor substitute for Sookie, but at least he could drain her near to death without concern. He heard the snarls of Were and shifter fighting, but didn't care what Merlotte and the other dogs might do to one another. If their pathetic spat left Sookie alone and frightened, so much the better for him. Among the high-pitched yelps of the beasts, he never even noticed the sound of Sookie receiving her death blow. As usual, by the time he understood what was happening, it was too late.

The fiasco of trying to buy Louisiana was the final straw for Bill's time in America. King de Castro had never intended to actually sell the kingdom of Louisiana to Compton. Even foolish baby vampires knew that kingdoms were rightfully won through might and maneuvering, not money. It was a bit of a joke by Felipe to give Bill one more thing to needle Eric about, to spur him on to rebellion—a jape initiated before Sookie's death. Felipe had learned that the younger vampire had also competed for Miss Stackhouse's affections, and enjoyed any opportunity to taunt the Northman.

Unfortunately, the idiot Compton blabbed that he would be buying Louisiana to many vampires (including one on the Council) before the joke could play out. Felipe suffered no consequences for his mischief in offering the sale, while Bill was "allowed" to leave for Peru in humiliation after training his sister Judith to maintain the vampire database and making it an asset of the ruling council rather than an individual kingdom.

**Judith Vardamon **

Judith made many improvements to the vampire database, including removing the cheesy login screen. She converted the database from outdated CDs to a web-based social network, allowing vampires to update some of their own information (maintaining a vetted copy on the back end) and to control the privacy of some of their more sensitive data. No longer needing to hide away from her now-dead maker and exiled brother, Judith began to flourish in the vampire community, building on her own extensive tech skills and doing lucrative consulting work throughout North America, Asia, and Europe.

**Pam Ravenscroft**

Pam was a great sheriff of Area Five for a little more than a year, but was gravely injured in a Fellowship of the Sun attack on Fangtasia not long after Sookie died. The most violent of the FotS adherents had "celebrated" the telepath's death by planning numerous coordinated attacks on notable vampire businesses, and made sure the effects at places Sookie had frequented were especially gruesome as retribution for Steve Newlin's injuries while kidnapping the girl. Pam barely survived, and many Area Five vampires were lost. Thalia is keeping Pam safe while she recovers, and Amelia is providing healing potions to ease the lengthy and painful process.

Pam still does not forgive Eric for ignoring her advice about Sookie and Freyda and letting everything go to shit, and believes Karin was right to ask for release. She is considering doing the same thing herself if Eric ever makes it out of captivity.

**Freyda**

Freyda is hardly worth mentioning. She continues to be a beautiful but cruel queen, and at times seems to serve no purpose but to make others miserable.

**Amelia Broadway**

After Sookie died and Amelia's father disappeared, Amelia took off to California for a while to get a break from Louisiana. While in San Diego, she met several witches who were focused on healing magic and began learning their trade. When she returned, Octavia helped her set up an internship with Dr. Ludwig, who barely tolerates the talkative witch. Amelia is currently developing potions to assist in Pam's healing, and hopes her restorative work can offset some of the past damage she has done. Amelia continues to believe that if she had known more, and been there at the right times, she could have saved both Trey and Sookie.

Despite her pregnancy, Amelia didn't stay with Bob. It had been clear that she never really liked him that much anyway, and Bob's obsessive insistence on naming their baby after a cartoon cat was the last straw. Amelia has custody of their child, whom she calls by his middle name, and practices her healing magic on his diaper rashes, teething pains, and other baby ailments. So far, there have been no major accidents.

Amelia never learned about Sookie's cruel imprisonment of Copely Carmichael or of her abandoning him to Pam and Karin as vampire chow. She had never gotten along with her dad all that well, but Sookie's choices would have been unforgivable—so much more so than Amelia's simple meddling in Sookie's love life. To this day, Amelia sometimes keeps an eye out for her dad in crowds and wonders if he will ever be coming home—and wishes Sookie was still around to help investigate his disappearance.

**Jason and Michele Stackhouse**

Jason and Michele had a reasonably happy marriage and two children, Adele and Dermot. Adele was a perfectly normal little girl who took after her mama. When younger brother Dermot started talking it became clear that he took after his aunt Sookie. Because Sookie was gone, and she had never told Jason about Hunter, Barry, or Mr. Cataliades, little Dermot had no more help with his telepathy growing up than Sookie had received. Jason only knew that Sookie had been repeatedly chastised to keep her "disability" hidden, and that life had become dangerous for her when word got out to the supernatural community. Jason and Michele did the best they could, but Dermot was always able to pick up on their constant worry that he'd be found out and harmed. Jason's thoughts wishing his little man could just be normal were particularly harmful, and there was nobody there to help Dermot to build up his shields.

At age 17, Dermot killed himself after years of "hearing" the children and adults of Bon Temps thinking hateful thoughts about his being just like his "crazy" Aunt Sookie, as well as their surprise that the "fangbanging freak" had survived as long as she did. When he realized he was gay—in the still very intolerant rural south—he was unable to bear the increase in the extreme pressure he already felt to be "normal." Dermot didn't come out as gay to his parents until he wrote it in his suicide note. Adele had left for college by then, and couldn't bring herself to return to Bon Temps after her baby brother's tragic death.

Jason and Michele's marriage couldn't survive the stress of caring for a telepathic child, his suicide, and Adele's subsequent estrangement. Michele left, and Jason eventually died after an infection caused by an injury he'd gotten during a monthly panther run.

**Hunter Savoy**

Despite Sookie's desire to protect Hunter from discovery by the supernatural community, Sookie's death—and her interaction with him in general—left him vulnerable to future pursuit by supernaturals. Sookie died with no knowledge or control over who Claude or Agent Lattesta might have told about the boy, whether Eric had ever mentioned him to Pam or Karin with the intent of protecting him, or to whom Hunter himself might have mentioned his special "aunt" Sookie. In fact, Sookie had been so determined to keep him away from vampires, she'd never even bothered to make sure he couldn't be glamoured, or to teach him about glamour at all. Hunter didn't learn for many years that he was mildly susceptible to glamour and could occasionally read vampires' thoughts.

Agent Lattesta, bitter about being warned off from pursuing Sookie, started a file on Hunter at the FBI. Although Lattesta perished in a FotS bombing, the file survived, leading to Hunter's being continually monitored, pursued, and harassed by the agency. Eventually, Hunter met and fell hard for a lovely, nice-seeming girl, only to learn that she was pursuing him as a potential agent rather than out of any genuine personal interest. Without the backing of powerful fairies and vampires, Hunter was less successful than Sookie had been in getting the government to leave him alone, and his life was never truly his own after that.

**Niall Brigant**

Niall reopened and closed the fairy portal several more times as he got bored and as was convenient over the years, but he never managed to do anything useful to protect or aid any of his other descendants. The next owners of Sookie's ancestral home had to spray excessive amounts of chemicals to control the absurd overgrowth across the property that resulted from Niall's "blessing." Nothing was able to grow there for many years.

**-The End-**

PS-Whew. That one's been kicking around in my brain for a while. I didn't like DEA, but I also didn't think Sookie was very likely to get a long, safe life just because she was cut loose from Eric. I'll take depressing but logical over an illogical "happily ever after" any day.

There's a new one shot challenge out: Red Wedding SVM style. I'd love to read some bloody wedding scenes along that theme, so get cracking! (www dot thesookieverse dot com/2014/04/weekly-one-shot-challenge dot html)


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